The "Middle East and Terrorism" Blog was created in order to supply information about the implication of Arab countries and Iran in terrorism all over the world. Most of the articles in the blog are the result of objective scientific research or articles written by senior journalists.

From the Ethics of the Fathers: "He [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say, it is not incumbent upon you to complete the task, but you are not exempt from undertaking it."

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Saturday, January 28, 2012

European and American perfidy in dealing with Iran's nuclear weapons program apparently has no end. This week we were subject to banner headlines announcing that the EU has decided to place an oil embargo on Iran. It was only when we got past the bombast that we discovered that the embargo is only set to come into force on July 1.

Following its European colleagues, the Obama administration announced it is also ratcheting up its sanctions against Iran... in two months. Sometime in late March, the US will begin sanctioning Iran's third largest bank.

At the same time as the Europeans and the Americans announced their phony sanctions, they reportedly dispatched their Turkish colleagues to Tehran to set up a new round of nuclear talks with the ayatollahs. If the past is any guide, we can expect for the Iranians to agree to sit down and talk just before the oil embargo is scheduled to be enforced. And the Europeans - with US support - will use the existence of talks to postpone indefinitely the implementation of the embargo.

There is nothing new in this game of fake sanctions. And what it shows more than anything is that the Europeans and the Americans are more concerned with pressuring Israel not to attack Iran's nuclear installations than they are in preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear power.

Obama has a second target audience - American Jews. He is using his fake sanctions as a means of convincing American Jews that he is a pro-Israel president and that in the current election season, not only should they cast their votes in his favor, they should sign their checks for his campaign.

Both Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak were quick this week to make clear that these moves are insufficient. They will not force Iran to abandon its nuclear weapons program. More is needed.

As to American Jewry, the jury is still out.

In truth, American Jewry's diffidence towards taking a stand on Iran, or recognizing Obama's dishonesty on this issue specifically and his dishonesty regarding his position on US-Israel ties generally is not rooted primarily in American Jews' devotion to Obama. It isn't even specifically related to American Jewry's devotion to the political Left. Rather it has to do with American Jewish ambivalence to Israel.

The roots of that ambivalence - which is shared by other Western Jewish communities to varying degrees - predate Obama's presidency.

Indeed, they predate the establishment of the State of Israel. And now, as the US and the EU have given Iran at least another six months to a year to develop its nuclear bombs unchecked, it is worth considering the nature and influence of this ambivalence.

Today's principal form of Jew-hatred is anti- Zionism. Anti-Zionism is similar to previous dominant forms of Jew hatred such as Christian anti-Judaism, xenophobic and racist anti- Semitism, and Communist anti-Jewish cosmopolitanism in the sense that it takes dominant, popular social trends and turns them against the Jews. Anti-Zionism's current predominance owes to the convergence of several popular social trends which include Western post-nationalism, and anti-colonialism.

The problem that anti-Zionism poses for American Jewry is that it forces them to pay a price for supporting Israel. This is problematic because Zionism has never been fully embraced by American Jewry. Since the dawn of modern Zionism, the cause of Jewish self-determination placed American Jewish leaders in an uncomfortable dilemma.

UNLIKE EVERY other Diaspora Jewish community, the American Jewish community has always perceived itself as a permanent community rather than an exilic community. American Jews have always viewed the United States as the new Promised Land.

With the formation of the modern Zionist movement in the late 19th century, American Jews found themselves on the horns of a dilemma. Clearly, the state of world Jewry was such that national self-determination had become an existential necessity for non-American Jews.

But while supporting Jewish refugees and a scrappy little country was okay, support for the Zionist cause of Jewish national liberation involved an acceptance of the fact that Israel - not the US - is the Jewish homeland. Moreover, it involved accepting that there are Jewish interests that are independent of - if not necessarily in contradiction with - American interests. For instance, irrespective of the prevailing winds in Washington, and regardless of whether the US supports Israel or not, it is a Jewish interest that Israel exists, thrives and survives.

In a recent op-ed in Haaretz, Hebrew University political science professor Shlomo Avineri contrasted world Jewry's massive mobilization on behalf of Soviet Jewry in the 1970s and 1980s and their relative silence today in the face of Iran's Holocaust denial and open calls for the annihilation of the Jewish state. Avineri is apparently confounded by the disparity between Western Jewry's behavior in the two cases.

But the cause of the disparity is clear. Supporting the right of Soviet Jews to emigrate was easy. Unlike Israel, Soviet Jews were powerless. As such, they were pure victims and supporting them cost Diaspora Jews nothing in terms of their position in their societies.

Just as important, the cause of freedom for Soviet Jewry was perfectly aligned with the West's Cold War policies against the Soviet Union. The frequent Jewish demonstrations outside Soviet legations provided Western leaders with another tool to fight the Cold War.

In contrast, supporting Israel, and the cause of Jewish freedom and self-determination embodied by Zionism, is not cost-free for Diaspora Jews. At root, to support Israel and Zionism involves accepting that Jews have inherent rights as Jews. To be a Zionist Jew in the Diaspora means that you embrace and defend the notion that the Jews have the right to their own interests and that those interests may be distinct from other nations' interests. That is, to be a Zionist involves rejecting Jewish assimilation and embracing the fact that Jews require national independence and power to guarantee our survival. And this can be unpleasant.

PRO-ISRAEL AMERICAN Jews have historically tried to tie their support for Israel to larger, more universal themes, in order to extricate themselves from the need to admit that as Jews and supporters of Israel they have a right and a duty to support Jewish freedom even if it isn't always pretty. Again, for Israel's first several decades, it was about helping poor Jews and refugees. In recent years, the predominant defense has been that Israel deserves support because it is a democracy.

Certainly, these are both reasonable reasons for supporting Israel. But neither support for Israel because it was poor nor support for Israel because it is free is a specifically Zionist reason for supporting Israel. You don't have to be a Zionist to support poor Jewish refugees and you don't have to be a Zionist to support democracy.

You do have to be a Zionist however, to defend the Jews in Israel and throughout the world in a coherent manner when the predominant form of Jew-hatred is anti-Zionism.

You have to be willing to accept and defend the right of the Jewish people to freedom and self-determination in our national homeland against those who deny that right. You have to be a Zionist to defend Israel's right to survive and thrive even though it is no longer poor and its democratically elected government is not liked by the Obama administration.

And you have to be a Zionist to realize that since Jewish survival is dependent on Jewish power, and anti-Zionists reject the right of Jews to have power, that anti-Zionists seek to bring about a situation where Jewish survival is imperiled.

The weakness of American Jewry's response to Iran's genocidal intentions towards Israel is of a piece with its weak response to the forces of anti-Zionism generally and to Jewish anti- Zionists particularly. Since 2007, the US government has effectively ruled out the use of force against Iran's nuclear weapons program and embraced a policy of pursuing negotiations with ayatollahs while enacting impotent sanctions to quell congressional pressure. At least in part, this policy is due to the US's assessment that a nuclear Iran does not pose a high-level threat to US national security.

Both then-president George W. Bush and later Barack Obama determined that an Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear weapons program does pose a high-level threat to the US. As a consequence, both administrations have taken concerted steps to prevent Israel from attacking Iran.

On the merits, both of these policies are easily discredited. But the fact that they continue to be implemented shows that they are supported by a large and powerful constituency in Washington.

To oppose Iran's nuclear program effectively, American Jews are required to oppose these strongly supported US policies. And at some point, this may require them to announce they support Israel's right to survive and thrive even if that paramount right conflicts with how the US government perceives US national interests.

That is, it may require them to embrace Zionism unconditionally.

No doubt, if they do so, their own conditions will improve. They will finally be able to speak coherently against the gathering forces of anti-Zionism - both from within the Jewish community and from without. This in turn will act as a lightning rod for inspiring American Jews to embrace their Judaism.

With their leaders having abjectly failed to contend with the most powerful form of Jew-hatred, it is no wonder that so many Diaspora Jews are leaving the fold. If they reverse course and go after their attackers, American Jewish leaders will give community members a meaningful reason to proudly embrace their identity.

In a speech this week at the Knesset, Netanyahu explained the different lessons the Holocaust teaches the international community on the one hand, and the Jews on the other.

As far as its universal lessons are concerned, Netanyahu said, "The lesson is that the countries of the world must be woken up, as much as possible, so that they can organize against such crimes.

The lesson is that the broadest possible alliances must be forged in order to act against this threat before it is too late."

As for the Jews, Netanyahu embraced Zionism's core principle: "With regard to threats to our very existence, we cannot abandon our future to the hands of others.

"With regard to our fate, our duty is to rely on ourselves alone."

We must hope that world Jewry will recognize today that the fate of the Jewish people in Israel and throughout the world is indivisible and rally to Israel's side whatever the social cost of doing so. But even if they do not recognize this basic truth, the imperatives of Zionism, of the Jewish people, remain in place.

Russia and Turkey joined forces to declare that more sanctions against Iran will not help to resolve the nuclear issue. Instead of sanctions, they have called for more talks with the 5+1 group that includes the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China, and Germany:

"According to the Fars News Agency, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made the remarks at a statement issued at the end of a Joint Strategic Planning Group meeting in Moscow on Friday.

They said that Iran's nuclear issue can be resolved only through diplomatic means and a resumption of talks without preconditions."

China agrees. Her leaders have said that negotiations are the path to resolution of the conflict between the West and Iran.

In prayers yesterday in Tehran, Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami said "that European countries have in fact imposed sanctions on themselves because they are in [the] grip of financial difficulties and [the] oil embargo against Iran will aggravate their problems." Earlier this week, Kazem Jalali, a member of Iran's parliament said "that the European Union's oil embargo against Iran is meant to politicize the atmosphere for a new round of negotiations between Tehran and the 5+1 group"; the Iranian Foreign Ministry said "that the European Union will be responsible for the consequences of its ill-advised decision to impose oil [an] embargo against Iran"; and a YouTube video showed Iranians rushing to the bank to buy gold coins and dollars. Last Saturday, Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said "that talks between Tehran and the 5+1 group should start if [the] West has a sincere intention."

Comments by Iranian religious and political leaders and the clamor for gold and dollars by Iranian citizens suggest five things:

1. Despite what leaders in China, Russia, and Turkey have said, severe sanctions on Iran are working.

2. They are long overdue.

3. The Iranian people realize that their leaders are taking them down a path that threatens their nation's financial security and could possibly lead to war.

4. Iranian political leaders are using their clout with Turkey, China, and Russia to dissuade Western nations from pursuing further sanctions.

5. The Iranian government is feeling the pressure and their call for more talks with the 5+1 group is a desperate attempt to return to the status quo.

Talks designed to prevent Iran from continuing to pursue the development of nuclear weapons have been underway for almost a decade, and they have produced no results. Finally, severe sanctions appear to be working, and they are the last step before a military confrontation between Western nations and Iran. Rather than back away from sanctions as China, Russia, and Turkey suggest, the U.S. should pursue an even more vigorous campaign to impose financial hardship on Iran for its belligerent attempt to develop nuclear weapons which can have but two purposes: the elimination of Israel and hegemony over the Middle East.

Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich went at in what Nate Silver called “probably the most important GOP debate” of the campaign. The focus was mainly on the charges the two frontrunners have made against each other but when it came to foreign policy, the audience cheered Romney’s defense of Israel and Rick Santorum’s denunciation of the Obama administration towards “militant socialists” in Latin America.

The polls out of Florida have fluctuated wildly over the past week. In the days after Gingrich’s South Carolina victory, polls had him ahead by 8 or 9 points. Now, Romney has an average lead of 5 points, with several polls having him winning by 7 or 8 points. The two frontrunners swapped positions in just four days. The primary will be held on Tuesday, January 31.

On foreign policy, Mitt Romney had the most applause when he was asked about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He ridiculed the Obama administration for “disrespecting” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, calling for peace negotiations to be based on the 1967 borders and for criticizing Israel’s settlements in the West Bank while remaining silent as terrorist rockets fell on Israeli cities. He gave a passionate defense of Israel, saying that it is the Palestinians who are uninterested in a two-state solution. He argued that both Hamas and Fatah seek the destruction of Israel and that Palestinian children are taught with textbooks advocating the killing of Jews.

Newt Gingrich’s best moment on foreign policy was also about Israel. He defended his earlier statement that the Palestinians are an “invented” people, saying that before the 1970s, the Palestinians were just referred to as Arabs with Syrian, Jordanian, Egyptian or Lebanese nationalities. He said the Palestinian leadership is more interested in conflict than in improving the lives of the Palestinian people and uses the process as “war by another form.” The crowd loved it when he said that on his first day in office, he’d sign an executive order moving the embassy in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Rick Santorum was enthusiastically applauded when spoke about the intercontinental alliance between Islamic extremists like Iran and the “militant socialists” in Latin America, specifically in Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia that are “spreading like a cancer.” The source of that cancer, Santorum said, is the Castro regime. He said that President Obama had “sided with the leftists, sided with the Marxists” in Latin America against U.S. allies like Colombia and those in Honduras who tried to stop Manuel Zelaya, a Chavez ally, from forming a dictatorship.

Ron Paul repeatedly advocated using diplomacy and free trade as the best way of promoting security. He said that his rivals’ policies towards Cuba and Latin America would backfire and cause anti-Americanism because of their “bully attitude.” His most well-received foreign policy-related line was when he said that most of the American people “don’t see a jihadist under the bed every night.”

There were several clashes between the candidates in this debate. The biggest were between Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. Romney put him on the defensive over an ad that called him an “anti-immigrant,” which Florida Senator Marco Rubio defended him against. Romney said it was “repulsive,” that disagreements should be allowed to happen without “highly-charged epithets” and demanded an apology. Gingrich said that Romney would deport “grandmothers” who came to the U.S. illegally, which he denied.

The two frontrunners also battled over an ad accusing Gingrich of describing Spanish as the “language of the ghetto.” Wolf Blitzer asked Romney about it, who said he hadn’t seen the ad and was unsure if his campaign was behind it. He then asked Gingrich if that quote was accurate, to which he replied, “it’s taken totally out of context.” Romney responded, “Oh, well then he said it.” Later in the debate, Blitzer informed Romney that CNN confirmed that his campaign was running the ad, generating boos from the audience.

Gingrich’s relationship with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was also a point of contention. Romney said that the country “needed a whistleblower, not a horn-tooter” and that Gingrich’s second contract did not rule out lobbying. Gingrich rebutted that his campaign discovered earlier in the week that Romney has shares in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and Goldman Sachs, which is behind a lot of foreclosures in Florida. He asked Romney to say how much money he has made off of foreclosing peoples’ homes. Romney explained that he had a trustee manage a blind trust that was responsible for those shares and that Gingrich also had some.

Gingrich was also attacked for his pledge to build an American colony on the moon by the end of his second term. Romney accused him of pandering in each state and said that “promising hundreds of billions of dollars to make people happy is what got us into the trouble we’re in now.” Gingrich said that his plan would be mostly privately-funded and was doable with reform of NASA.

Rick Santorum shined when he told Romney and Gingrich to stop the “petty personal attacks” and to “leave it alone and focus on the issues.” Gingrich agreed to do so and he later asked Romney for a truce. Gingrich also criticized Wolf Blitzer for continuing with questions meant to stir up conflict, which Blitzer forcefully responded to.

Santorum’s hardest punch was landed on Romney over his health care plan in Massachusetts. He said it was the basis for ObamaCare and that Massachusetts has the highest health care costs in the country. One in four people do not get the care they need, Santorum said. He also said it would undermine Romney’s ability to beat Obama because “we can’t give away this issue this election.” Romney pledged to repeal ObamaCare and said that his plan was only directed at the 8% who did not have health care, while Obama’s affects everyone.

Overall, political analysts felt that Romney got the better of Gingrich. Nate Silver, grading on strategy and execution, gave grades of an A/A to Romney, A-/A to Santorum, B-/C to Paul and D-/B to Gingrich. Larry Sabato gave a B+ to Romney, B+ to Santorum, C+ to Gingrich and a C to Paul.

Dick Morris tweeted that if Romney wins Florida on Tuesday, then “the race is largely over” because of the favorability of February’s contests to Romney. Morris explains that the Nevada caucus will be held next Saturday, February 4, which is certain to be won by Romney. The Maine caucus, which Romney will also probably win, begins that day and lasts a week. On February 7, Colorado and Minnesota, two states that Romney won last time, are holding caucuses. Then, on February 22, the only debate of the month will be held. The contests in Michigan and Arizona are held on February 28. Romney is certain to win the former and, in Morris’ opinion, very likely to win the latter. If Romney wins Florida, that will be a winning streak of 7 contests in a 30-day period.

If Romney holds his lead in the polls, then he will win Florida and will be the undisputed frontrunner for the Republican nomination.

The world’s largest drug field was formerly in the Bekaa Valley where the land is warm and moist. Reflecting the poor state of agriculture in the Muslim world, some of the most arable land in Lebanon where the Romans raised acres of wheat was turned over to cannabis and opium production. In the ’90s the situation was so bad that 80 percent of the world’s cannabis came out of the valley. The valley helped finance the PLO, Hezbollah and the Syrian army which invaded Lebanon partly to get in on the drug trade.

The Clinton Administration cut deals with the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Syrian occupation of Lebanon to try and cut down on production. Officially production went down, unofficially the party never really stopped.

With the Syrians gone and the PLO living off American foreign aid on the West Bank of Israel, the lucrative Lebanese drug trade is in the hands of the Shiite Islamists of Hezbollah. Drugs have turned the Party of Allah into a global narcoterrorist ring with tentacles in Latin America and ties to Marxist narcoterrorists there and up to America and out across Europe and Asia.

There is no contradiction between the Islamic identity of Hezbollah and its drug trade financed wealth. The Mumbai terrorists of the Army of the Righteous, who during their killing spree murdered a rabbi and his pregnant wife, snorted cocaine. The Beslan terrorists of the Islamic Brigade of Martyrs who murdered hundreds of children were running on heroin. Forensic tests conducted on the bodies of suicide bombers have found that they were routinely given heroin before being sent off on their missions. And if we had been able to run forensic tests on the Al-Qaeda terrorists who carried out September 11 there would probably be a miniature pharmacy in their bodies.

The intimate connection between drugs and Islam began with the prohibition of alcohol. The ban on wine and other spirits made the need for alternatives more urgent. Coffee was the safer alternative to alcohol, and the Middle Eastern obsession with it reflected the outlawing of wine and beer. Religiously coffee was also useful as a stimulant and came in handy in some Muslim rites. But there were more efficacious stimulants that could do more than coffee and those were equally popular.

While there were at times attempts to similarly prohibit drugs, they never achieved the same status as the ban on liquor. Hashish in particular had useful religious and military effects. The right drugs could give the devout the illusion of a mystical experience, allow them to stay up all night memorizing verses from the Koran or make it easier for them to kill and for Muslim leaders to control their private armies.

The Order of Assassins, whose name “Hashishin” derives from the substance they were addicted to, consisted of young men given the drug and told that their visions were a foretaste of paradise. While the Hashishin achieved legendary status the same pattern has become commonplace among Muslim terrorist groups who ply their followers with drugs to addict them and direct them along the path of Islamic terror as the road to the paradise of the powder and the needle.

Culturally the use of drugs is far more widely accepted in the Muslim world than alcohol is. The Ayatollah Khomeini even ruled that, “Wine and all other intoxicating beverages are impure, but opium and hashish are not.” In some countries drug use is so widespread that it has practically become a national identity. That is the case with Qat in Yemen, a plant-based amphetamine whose use is so widespread that its cultivation consumes nearly half the country’s water supply.

While the Yemeni Qat addiction is fairly obvious, entire Muslim countries which do not have oil run on their drug trade. Pakistan’s largest real export is its off-the-books heroin trade and its economy runs on heroin. The ISI, Pakistan’s intelligence agency, which backed the Taliban, also took a cut of Afghanistan’s highly profitable opium trade. Iranian and Pakistani interference in Afghanistan marry their Islamic initiatives with the drug trade as Sunnis and Shiites compete for the lucrative traffic in the world’s leading source of opium which is smuggled through Pakistan and Iran.

Speaking of Iran, the Islamic Republic has the world’s highest percentage of heroin addicts, and the traffic is run by the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution which acts as the religious thugs of the ayatollahs. One of their means of smuggling heroin out of Iran is piggybacking the trade on Shiite Muslim pilgrims visiting holy sites abroad.

The Muslim world doesn’t have much to export besides oil and drugs. Countries that don’t have oil export drugs. Countries that do have oil, export drugs anyway. Terrorist groups with their secret cells, forged documents and covert funding sources make perfect drug smuggling networks until it is impossible to tell whether they are Islamic terrorists who smuggle drugs to fund their operations or drug smugglers who kill people to religiously justify their drug smuggling. When the commanders and the foot soldiers have spent enough time in the drug trade and are sampling their own product then they stop knowing the difference.

The miserable state of agriculture in Muslim countries can be partly attributed to this toxic mix of drugs and jihadists. Subsidized food prices give farmers more incentive to cultivate opium than wheat. Islamic groups provide protection and drug smuggling routes to fund their activities. Food prices rise and the popular protests are hijacked by the Islamic groups who can hand out food backed by their real cash crops. From that angle the Arab Spring looks more like an Islamic Cartel Woodstock. FARC with a Koran instead of Das Kapital.

Drunks are not particularly dangerous. It’s hard to weaponize them in the same way that Islamic groups have weaponized drug users. Islamic drug cartels are in the process of turning parts of Asia and the Middle East into theocracies overseen by the Koran and the needle. But while the cartels make much of their money selling their products to the infidels in America and Europe, most of their real users are at home.

The American and European drug trade brings big profits but requires long journeys that pass under the vigilant eyes of first world customs inspections. It’s much easier and simpler to sell the stuff at home in Iran and Pakistan. The godfathers of Islamic terrorism in Tehran and Islamabad are not only funding Islamic terror using drug money, they are addicting their own populations en masse. Countries cannot become major drug exporters without also creating a major domestic market for drugs along the way. While the ISI and the mullahs have tried to poison the West for profit, they have done a much more thorough job of poisoning themselves with their own wares.

While Islamists like to think of themselves as the moral alternative to the decadent West, they have thoroughly corrupted themselves and their own people. The heroin addicts of Iran and Pakistan are a grim reminder that Islam is not only brutal and violent; it is also a force of moral decay that justifies any crime in the name of its religious aspirations. The millions of Muslim heroin addicts who were made that way by heroin smuggled in the name of Islam are the true fruits of the Islamic Revolution.

Malik 42, a rickshaw-puller, described to his wife Anwara, "If we send our daughter to Middle East, the land of the Emirs, all of our stresses and adversities will fade away. She will get an attractive job over there. A very reliable, kind and rich man came from Dhaka. He will provide everything. In case of money shortage, he will let us a sum of expenditure as credit."

So the couple decided to send their only child, Tania, 13, to Dubai to work as a maidservant. At the time they gave their hard-earned $500 to a broker. Nobody knows where Tania is now.

Hundreds of young girls are being forced to stow away to go into Indian and Pakistani prostitution, to live a completely sub-human life. In the Middle East, most of the trafficked girls from Bangladesh are subjected of commercial sexual exploitation, perverted sexual abuse in the name of "domestic service."

These are common scenarios of the remote areas and even sometimes in the district towns of Bangladesh, where the families are losing their daughters and young boys those are being used for terrible purposes.

On December 12, the Bangladeshi cabinet approved a new law that calls for the death penalty for human trafficking. Since December 12, there have been a dozen cases reported by the media after some victims died on the way to their forced destinations.

According to U.S. Department of State's report 2011, however, "Bangladesh does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking, and is placed on Tier-2 Watch List for a third consecutive year." The Home & Communication adviser of the interim [dubbed an "emergency" government] government of Bangladesh in 2007, and later the elected relevant authority, confessed that the number of victims, as some non-government organizations also reported, is as high as 40 thousand a year.

The U.S. state department also reported that, "The Government of Bangladesh made some efforts to protect victims of trafficking over the last three years. The government's insufficient efforts to protect victims of forced labor – who constitute a large share of victims in the country – and adult male victims of trafficking is a continuing concern. The government did not have a systematic procedure to identify trafficking victims and vulnerable populations, and to refer victims of trafficking to protective services."

In a parliamentary election in Bangladesh in 2008, before which all political parties declared what was to be in their manifestos, it was extremely disappointing that not one political party proposed to stop trafficking. Instead, they all emphasized the "Blasphemy Act:" both the so-called secular and religious parties gave commitments not to prepare any law against the guidelines of the Koran.

This is why the new initiative, forced by the Western countries and taken by the Bangladeshi government, is not working properly.

Bangladesh is now the most densely populated country in the world. More than 80% of the people here are Muslim and strongly believe that Islam does not allow any kind of birth control. Consequently the average birthrate in the Islam dominated states is three times higher than the rest of the world. So we see a rickshaw-puller, a day laborer, having five or six children, while we see success stories of family planning in the formal papers of the government and the non-governmental organizations.

If the camel-jockey issue, of boys as young as six being forced to race camels has been eliminated after the international community noticed and took the problem seriously, so can trafficking, as well as child labor in shocking conditions, be eliminated, too.

Irish actor Liam Neeson says he is thinking about becoming a Muslim after undergoing a spiritual awakening in Turkey.

Neeson, who was born into a Roman Catholic family in Ballymena, Northern Ireland, told the London-based newspaper The Sun that he was impressed by the religious atmosphere in Istanbul while filming a movie in the city.

He said: "The [Islamic] call to prayer happens five times a day, and for the first week, it drives you crazy, and then it just gets into your spirit, and it's the most beautiful, beautiful thing. There are 4,000 mosques in the city. Some are just stunning, and it really makes me think about becoming a Muslim."

Neeson is just one of hundreds of thousands of Europeans who are trading their Christian heritage for the supposed exoticism of Islam. The surge in conversions is contributing to the mainstreaming of Islam in Europe and contributing to the Islamization of the continent.

In Britain, the number of Muslim converts recently passed the 100,000 mark, according to a survey conducted by an inter-faith group called Faith Matters. The survey revealed that nearly two thirds of the converts were women, more than 70% were white and the average age at conversion was just 27.

The survey, conducted by Kevin Brice from Swansea University in Wales, asked converts for their views on the negative aspects of British culture. They identified alcohol and drunkenness, a "lack of morality and sexual permissiveness" and "unrestrained consumerism."

More than one in four acknowledged there was a "natural conflict" between being a devout Muslim and living in Britain. Nine out of ten women converts said their change of religion had led to them dressing more conservatively. More than half started wearing a head scarf and 5% had worn the burka.

Separately, government authorities revealed that an increasing number of inmates at British prisons are converting to Islam. For example, one-third of the inmates at one of Britain's most notorious youth jails are Muslims and the religion is attracting a large number of converts.

There are 229 Muslims out of a total of 686 youngsters detained at Feltham Young Offenders' Institution in West London, according to Ministry of Justice figures. There are now so many worshippers at Friday prayers that they have to be split between Feltham's mosque and its gym.

Prison insiders say most non-Muslims are locked up during Friday prayers because so many guards are needed to monitor the lunchtime service. As a consequence, many disillusioned youngsters are becoming attracted to Islam by the prospect of getting better food and superior treatment at the prison.

One of the more prominent Britons to convert to Islam is Lauren Booth, sister-in-law of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Booth, who converted after feeling a "shot of spiritual morphine" on a trip to Iran, now wears a hijab head covering whenever she leaves her home and prays five times a day.

In France, an estimated 70,000 French citizens have converted to Islam in recent years, according to a report by France 3 public television. As in Britain, the majority of converts to Islam in France are young women who say they are disenchanted with materialism.

In Italy, Ambassador Alfredo Maiolese, an Italian MP, recently became a Muslim and now dedicates his time trying to improving the image of Islam in the West. In Sweden, there are now at least 5,000 converts to Islam.

In Germany, at least 20,000 people have converted to Islam in recent years, according to a report by RTL television. Some of these converts are playing a growing role in jihad in Germany. In 2010, for example, two German converts to Islam who were found guilty of plotting to create what a judge called a "monstrous blood bath" by carrying out terrorist attacks against American targets in Germany.

"This trend has taken on a very threatening quality toward our security, and while not every convert is a potential terrorist, we are facing a sort of homegrown terrorism that has sprouted in our own backyard," according to Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble.

Many European coverts to Islam on fact become vastly more pious than Muslims who were born into Islam. Such converts, taking an absolutist approach, are often easily led into extremism.

In Belgium, for example, Muriel Degauque, a woman from Charleroi and a convert to Islam, committed a suicide car bomb attack in November 2005 against American troops in Iraq. A bakery worker, Degaugue had married a Muslim man and quickly became radical in her religious views.

In Switzerland, young converts to Islam are a potential threat to the country's security, according to Alard du Bois-Reymond, who was head of the Swiss Migration Office until he was removed for his politically incorrect observations.

Du Bois-Reymond told the German-language newspaper NZZ am Sonntag that Swiss converts include people who want a "radically different society" and are "resistant to dialogue." He described the Central Islamic Council of Switzerland, which was founded and is run by Swiss converts to Islam, as "the most radical group in Switzerland."

Also in Switzerland, Daniel Streich, a former member of the Swiss People's Party (SVP) who rose to fame for his campaign against the construction of minarets for mosques, converted to Islam. He now says Switzerland needs more mosques.

In Spain, at least 50,000 native Spaniards have converted to Islam in recent years, many of them women. Webislam.net, a Spanish-language website devoted to propagating Islam in Spain, recently published an article that encourages Spanish women to wed Muslim men. The article describes marriage to a Muslim this way: "Multiculturalism is a rewarding experience for all concerned."

Soeren Kern is Senior Fellow for Transatlantic Relations at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook.

The feminism I once championed — and still do — was first taken over by Marxists and subsequently “Stalinized.” It was then conquered again by Islamists and “Palestinianized.” I and a handful of others maintained honorable minority positions on a host of issues. In time, women no longer mattered as much to many feminists — at least, not as much as Edward Said’s Arab men of color did. The Arab men were more fashionable victims who had not only been formerly “colonized” but who, to this day, are still being “occupied” by allegedly “apartheid”–intentioned Jews.

While most of my generation of feminists have long ago retired, died, fallen ill, or have continued to rest visibly on their own earliest laurels, I continue to champion universalist values and to resist the death-grip of multicultural relativism.

Recently, the New York Times gave a relatively glowing review to this new work. According to critic Dwight Garner, the two women are “such opposites that, as the author memorably observes, ‘Like the bikini and the burka or the virgin and the whore, you couldn’t quite understand one without understanding the other.’”

Garner continues: “If you are wondering who is the bikini (and thus the whore) in that formulation, Ms. Scroggins leaves little doubt that it is Ms. Hirsi Ali, whom her book relentlessly attacks.”

Hirsi Ali is indeed “wanted”— but by misogynist Islamists whom she exposes and opposes. Siddiqui, “Lady Al Qaeda,” was indeed “wanted” and is now in prison for attempting to kill American soldiers in Afghanistan for al-Qaeda. In 2003, the FBI “named her as the only known female operative of al-Qaeda.” In 2010, Siddiqui, a devout Muslim and a Brandeis-educated Pakistani, was sentenced to 86 years in jail.

Which of the two women do you think Scroggins prefers? The brave feminist freedom fighter Hirsi Ali, or the pro-Islamist and terrorist Siddiqui? Scroggins finds a “weird symmetry” between the two. Of all the false moral equivalents with which I am forced to live, this rankles quite a bit. But Scroggins sees them both as “rebels,” as sister-equivalents.

Siddiqui became a rabid antisemite. And a terrorist. This does not bother Scroggins as much as Hirsi Ali’s “imperiousness” and “egomania” does — that, and the fact that Hirsi Ali accepted a perch at the (conservative) American Enterprise Institute. From Scroggins’ point of view, the fact that Hirsi Ali has embraced universal human rights, outlined a pro-Western critique of political Islam, and supported the war in Iraq renders her something of a war criminal.

Maybe Scroggins even views Siddiqui as the true freedom fighter.

As a student in America, Siddiqui joined the infamous Muslim Students Association and fell under the spell of one of bin Laden’s own mentors who ran a Muslim charity in Brooklyn, New York. Siddiqui’s second husband’s uncle was none other than Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the man who planned 9/11. Apparently, the kindly uncle-in-marriage gave up her name to interrogators. However, Siddiqui and her children had disappeared. She was not found until 2008, wandering around in Afghanistan with bomb-making formulas in her possession as well as plans for mass casualty attacks. Under questioning she picked up a gun and shot at her captors.

Scroggins and her supporters have argued that Siddiqui is both mentally ill and/or that she was brainwashed by al-Qaeda and other Islamist groups which, in turn, led to her mental illness. (Siddiqui could be mentally ill.) Nevertheless, Scroggins and her supporters absolutely refuse to criticize a terrorist group that routinely sacrifices their own women, children, and men without remorse or that exploits the mentally ill among them.

This 2012 book may be rooted in an earlier essay which appeared in the pages of The Nation magazine in 2005 (subscription required to read.) At the time, I could not believe what I was reading. Scroggins took off after the heroic and besieged Hirsi Ali. Her piece was funded by the Investigative Fund at the Nation Institute. The essay was titled “The Dutch-Muslim Culture War: Ayaan Hirsi Ali Has Enraged Muslims with her Attacks on their Sexual Mores.” Scroggins did not view Hirsi Ali as a hero but rather as a reactionary and a traitor who left the Left Labor Party and became affiliated with the political “center right” in Holland.

Scroggins saw Hirsi Ali as part of an anti-immigration, anti-Muslim, and anti-Islam faction that included the assassinated filmmaker Theo Von Gogh and politician Geert Wilders who dared argue that Muslims “assimilate” to the more “humane” and “higher level” European culture.

Obviously, Scroggins believes that Europe should return to the anti-infidel 7th century instead.

Scroggins judges Hirsi Ali by the politically incorrect company she keeps rather than by whether she is telling the truth. Scroggins condemns Hirsi Ali for revealing that the prophet Mohammed was a pedophile because he married a six-year-old girl and then consummated the marriage when she was nine years old. (Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff has recently been found criminally liable in Austria for telling this rather inconvenient truth.)

In classic left-feminist fashion, Scroggins attacks Hirsi Ali for “putting all the blame on Islam” instead of blaming “patriarchal customs”; for ignoring the work of Muslim feminists who have “shown that Islam’s sacred texts can be interpreted in more female-friendly ways”; and for failing to focus on the “role the West has played and continues to play in assisting the rise of the Islamist movements.”

Say what?

Thus, according to Scroggins, Hirsi Ali’s main thought crime is her refusal to blame the West for its history of imperialism, colonialism, capitalism, and racism. Obviously, Scroggins has not read the excellent works of Ibn Warraq (reviewed in these pages) and the work of Salim Mansur (which I will shortly review). Both are men of color, Muslims by birth, who understand the long history of Islamic imperialism, colonialism, racism, slavery, censorship, and real gender and religious apartheid. Like Hirsi Ali, both men understand the danger of “multicultural” societies in the West which encourage immigrants not to assimilate and which keep women, especially Muslim women, subordinate and enslaved.

However, contrary to all reason, Scroggins views Hirsi Ali’s passionate and feminist defense of both Muslim women and European and Western culture as “contributing” both to the rise of Islamism — and paradoxically, to anti-Muslim and anti-Islamic sentiment. Scroggins quotes an unnamed Muslim woman who sees Hirsi Ali as “nothing but an Uncle Tom.”

Scroggins then argues that “there have been many more attacks against Dutch Muslims than on non-Muslims.” She gives no sources, statistics, studies, or proof.

But “Islamophobia” is also a fashionable concept, far more so than is “Israelophobia” or “Judeophobia.” Scroggins does not care as much about the lethal sexism that Hirsi Ali decries as she does about the Muslim right to colonize the West, face-veil its women, censor, sue, even murder Muslim and ex-Muslim dissidents, and convert infidels by the sword.

Am I am “alarmist”? You bet I am. But that’s because I know a thing or two. Clearly, Scroggins and her kind do not.

Dr. Phyllis Chesler is the author of 14 books and an emerita professor of Psychology and Women’s Studies. She once lived in Kabul, Afghanistan. She may be reached through her website www.phyllis-chesler.com.

[Once], when her mother was seriously injured and was taken to an Israeli hospital, Gabriel noted the humanity of the Israelis in contrast to the propaganda against the Jews she says she saw as a child.

As an adult, using the name Nour Saman, Gabriel was a news anchor for World News, an Arabic-language evening news broadcast of Middle East Television, a Marjayoun-based station that was run by the now defunct SLA and funded by Israel. Broadcast in Israel, Egypt, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, through her work there, Gabriel covered the Israeli withdrawal from central Lebanon, the Israeli Security Zone (occupied South Lebanon), and the Palestinian uprising in the West Bank and Gaza. The television station moved to Cyprus for a time and was later purchased by Pat Robertson. Gabriel moved to Israel before immigrating to the United States in 1989 where she founded a television production, marketing and advertising agency.ACT! For America and American Congress for Truth

Gabriel is the founder of ACT! for America, a non-profit issues advocacy organization. ACT! for America has hundreds of chapters across America and members in 20 countries outside of America. She is also the founder of American Congress for Truth, a non-profit organization which denounces Islamic fundamentalism.

In this video clip, Brigitte Gabriel focuses on Islamic infiltration into the American education system.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

The Mufti of Jerusalem, Mohammed Hussein, the top Islamic official in Israel, stirred up a storm of protest with a speech he made recently in which he appeared to be calling for the murder of Jews and the comparing of Jews to pigs and apes.

Israel’s President Shimon Peres complained that the Jerusalem Mufti’s recent “Kill the Jews” statements “endanger the lives” of Jews and that action must be taken to prevent similar remarks, which he said can lead to a deterioration of relations between Jews and Arabs. He met with Justice Minister Yaakov Ne’eman, who promised an investigation of the Mufti’s sermon.

The actual statement was the following: “The hour of judgment will not come until you fight the Jews. The Jew will hide behind the stone and behind the tree. The stone and the tree will cry, 'Oh Muslim, Oh Servant of God, this is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.’”

This is a famous and highly respected quote from the Hadith, which is the oral tradition of Islam, taken from the teachings of Muhammad, the founder of Islam. Muhammad is considered by Muslims around the world to be “The Sunna”, or the model to be followed by all believing Muslims.

In this writer’s opinion, President Peres and others who speak of investigating the Mufti for incitement for reading a portion of Muslim doctrine are barking up the wrong tree. The Mufti is simply quoting from a revered text and he is inadvertently doing us a service, by revealing the violent directives given to Muslims in the Koran and the Hadith for how to deal with Jews and all non-Muslims.

These passages are not disavowed, not by the muftis, not the imams, and not by other practitioners of the so-called “religion of peace” and if we just glance at our neighbors here in the Middle East, we see that these verses are alive and well and ever-present in the doctrines of the Muslim Brotherhood, including its Hamas brethren, the Hezbollah, Al Qaeda, and yes, the Fatah terrorist organization, as well.

The Mufti was given a rousing introduction at that rally with the words, "Our war with the descendants of the apes and pigs is a war of religion and faith. Long live Fatah!"

This reminds me of a scholarly debate that was held at Al -Ahzar University in Egypt not so long ago, debating the highly respected verse in the Koran, which refers to the Jews and Christians as pigs and monkeys.

As everyone knows, Jews don’t eat pork because of a clear biblical prohibition. But why don’t Muslims? The debate at the university was over the question of whether the Jews of today are direct descendents of the Jews who were turned into pigs by Allah, or if we are imposters. As a result of that debate, Sheikh Ahmed Ali Othman, the supervisor of the Da’awa (Islamic Indoctrination) of the Egyptian Wakf, issued a fatwa (religious ruling) stating that the Jews indeed have their origins in the Jews that Allah turned into pigs and monkeys, and therefore, it is obligatory to kill and slaughter them (the pigs). He went on to say that whoever eats pork, it’s as if he is eating meat from an impure person.

In other words, the problem isn’t a biblical prohibition, nor is it the pig itself, it’s the Jews! He stressed that this ruling is backed by the scholars of Al-Ahzar University in Egypt, but that they are afraid to say so publicly.

The entire commotion over the Jerusalem Mufti’s statements should be a lesson for the nation of Israel. We are negotiating with a people whose very doctrine calls for our destruction and their recent electoral decisions are the manifestation of those beliefs. Their hatred is rooted in an evil ideology and is engrained deep in their religious beliefs and is expressed in their political actions.

The elections of Hamas in the Palestinian Authority, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafists in Egypt, and the Huzbullah in Lebanon should serve as a glaring red warning light that will cause us to put an immediate halt to all “peace” discussions with our Islamic neighbors. We need to start preparing for war, not peace.

David Rubin is a former Mayor of Shiloh, Israel and the Founder and President of the Shiloh Israel Children’s Fund.

This announcement comes on the heels of troubling revelations about Beck's firing and other disturbing trends at Fox. It quickly got front-page coverage at the Huffington Post, presumably to launch a campaign of ridicule and smears before Kincaid's idea builds momentum. No matter how much they sneer, the left is terrified of Beck.

Beck's firing was the work of George Soros, Kincaid has revealed. Soros funded Color of Change, the organization founded by Van Jones that launched a boycott against Fox after Beck (really Trevor Loudon) outed Jones as a communist. But Soros is also behind the groups Jewish Funds for Justice and Media Matters, both of which attacked Beck as an anti-Semite for his reporting about Soros' activities during WWII. Soros admitted in a 1998 CBS 60 Minutes interview that as a teenager in Hungary, he had participated in the confiscation of Jewish properties but felt no guilt about it.

Beck's demise apparently came some time after an article, published by Jewish Funds for Justice President Simon Greer, criticized Beck for his exposé on Soros. It was followed by a letter signed by hundreds of rabbis that was published in the Wall Street Journal demanding that Fox sanction Beck. Writing in the Jerusalem Post about Beck's departure, Caroline Glick blamed "the liberal American Jewish establishment," who, she said:

... rejected [Beck's] 'outspoken attacks on George Soros,' the 'extremist leftist anti-American and anti-Zionist global financier who has given more than $100 million to radical leftist groups.'

Fox now appears to be working with Soros. The network recently hired the radical-left, openly lesbian Sally Kohn, formerly of the Soros-funded Center for Community Change. The Center for Community Change received $5.8 million from Soros' Open Society Institute between 2004 and 2010. Its former Board Chair is Cecilia Munoz, now President Obama's White House director for intergovernmental affairs. Munoz is also a former National Council of La Raza vice president and former board member of the illegal immigrant advocacy group CASA de Maryland. She has been pushing housing grants to illegals in her White House position.

Sally Kohn has been a frequent guest on leftwing MSNBC host Ed Shultz's Ed Show. She is now a regular "Fox News Contributor." Her worldview is evident in an insufferably smug video where she explains her version of left and "right." You guessed it: we're all Nazis. She, on the other hand, is a "moderate." Sure. Now Fox will actually be paying someone to promote such stuff.

Yet despite Fox's compromises, or perhaps because of them, Soros is continuing his attacks. Geraldo Rivera recently reported that a former ABC colleague, Lowell Bergman, now a professor at Berkeley, is heading up a Soros-funded operation to dig up dirt on Fox. The radical-left ProPublica, which receives funding from Soros and Soros allies Herb and Marion Sandler and Peter Lewis, has teamed up with the Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism to dig up dirt on News Corp. properties, including Fox, the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Post.

In his call for Beck's return, Kincaid said:

Fox should stand up to Soros, not buckle under to his financial pressure. Fox News has been disintegrating since Soros-funded groups forced Glenn Beck off the air. His show was replaced by a program featuring Democratic Party hack Bob Beckel, who regularly insults conservatives.

It's time for Glenn Beck, now on Internet TV, to return to the cable channel so that he can continue his investigative journalism into the rapidly expanding influence of the Soros network of organizations. We urge Fox News CEO Roger Ailes to negotiate Beck's return at the earliest possible date.

Since its inception, Fox News has provided a much-needed change from the uniformly extreme-left bias of other cable and network TV news. Fox sticks out like a sore thumb in the overwhelmingly liberal media spectrum. But the modest voice conservatives enjoy on the nation's only non-radical-left news channel is vulnerable to political pressure. The corporate parent News Corporation is under immense pressure in the United Kingdom over the cell phone-hacking scandal involving its now-closed News of the World tabloid. The founder is aging, the presumptive heir is reportedly liberal, and none of the other cable news channels has moved to compete with FNC for the center-right majority.

The already unfavorable media environment for conservatives may look like the good old days all too soon.

George Soros is delighted that chaos is coming to his adopted homeland.

“In the crisis period, the impossible becomes possible,” the anti-American financier told Newsweek in a recent interview, restating the Alinskyite adage that a good crisis is a terrible thing to waste.

“I am not here to cheer you up. The situation is about as serious and difficult as I’ve experienced in my career,” Soros says. “We are facing an extremely difficult time, comparable in many ways to the 1930s, the Great Depression. We are facing now a general retrenchment in the developed world, which threatens to put us in a decade of more stagnation, or worse. The best-case scenario is a deflationary environment. The worst-case scenario is a collapse of the financial system.”

Like some of the more dimwitted commentators on economics, Soros loves to spew the usual socialist drivel about so-called market fundamentalism running amok as if he were living during the Cleveland administration. “The collapse of the Soviet system was a pretty extraordinary event, and we are currently experiencing something similar in the developed world, without fully realizing what’s happening.”

To people like Soros, the mortgage bubble was caused by the Snidely Whiplashes of the financial world, not by venal real-life politicians like Barney Frank and Chris Dodd and the monstrous financial blunderers known as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Free markets are to blame even though they have never been tried.

As the U.S. economy continues to deteriorate, anger will grow and rioting in the streets is sure to follow. “It’s already started,” he says. “Yes, yes, yes,” Soros adds “almost gleefully,” Newsweek writer John Arlidge editorializes.

For years Soros has longed for an opportunity to transform America into a socialist state. “The system we have now has actually broken down, only we haven’t quite recognized it and so you need to create a new one and this is the time to do it,” he said in 2009 as he created the Institute for New Economic Thinking with a $50 million endowment.

This Communist sympathizer co-founded the ultra-secretive Democracy Alliance, a billionaires’ club that funds leftist political infrastructure. He has said that European-style socialism “is exactly what we need now” and favors American decline. Soros praises Red China effusively, saying the totalitarian nation has “a better-functioning government than the United States.”

Soros now counts on the armies of street thugs that comprise the “Occupy” movement to ramp up the violence. He praises Occupy Wall Street as “an inchoate, leaderless manifestation of protest,” disingenuously distancing himself from the supposedly spontaneous uprising.

The movement will spread. It has “put on the agenda issues that the institutional left has failed to put on the agenda for a quarter of a century,” he says.

In a sense Soros is right. It’s impossible to turn on the radio or the TV without hearing today’s issues framed in Marxist terms, as pitting the “1 percent” against the “99 percent.”

In an impressive feat of cognitive dissonance Soros holds himself blameless for the state of the economy.

“Unrestrained competition can drive people into actions that they would otherwise regret,” said the convicted inside-trader whose speculative adventures have harmed perhaps hundreds of millions of people worldwide. “The tragedy of our current situation is the unintended consequence of imperfect understanding. A lot of the evil in the world is actually not intentional. A lot of people in the financial system did a lot of damage without intending to.”

When asked if the financial wizards who played a role in the economic meltdown were not just wrong but evil Soros replies, “That’s correct.”

In other words, this man who has described himself as “some kind of god” blames everyone else on Wall Street for the current economic mess.

Meanwhile, Soros has virtually admitted he plans to flood this year’s campaign with money to help Democratic candidates.

In case the economy doesn’t completely implode, Soros is counting on Democrats to help administer the coup de grace.

It is a year since the governor of Punjab, Salman Taseer, was gunned down by his own close protection officer in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.

A secular politician who championed women's rights and tried to reform the country's repressive religious ordinances, Taseer riled religious fundamentalists. The point of no return was finally crossed after he took up the case of Asia Bibi, a Pakistani Christian sentenced to death for blasphemy on questionable evidence.

While trying to secure her freedom, Taseer also declared his opposition to the constitutional discrimination against the Ahmadi/Qadyani sect, currently declared heretical by the Pakistani state.

The fallout was surreal. Supposedly educated and liberal minded lawyers who had brazenly defied President Musharraf when he imposed martial law now garlanded the assassin, Malik Mumtaz Hussein Qadri, outside the courthouse. The youth section of the Islamabad bar association even offered to represent Qadri pro bono. In the aftermath of Qadri's arrest, militant groups rallied thousands of supporters along the dense and twisting streets of Lahore where his family lived.

The message was simple: any politician who dared challenge the blasphemy law could expect a similar fate.

Since Taseer's assassination, an already sour case has turned even worse. Pakistani newspapers report that the man who originally accused Asia Bibi of blasphemy, Qari Salam, has had a change of heart. Describing him as a "guilty prayer leader," the Express Tribune notes:

At the forefront of a popular, polarizing case, Qari Salam ostensibly regrets filing a blasphemy charge against an impoverished Christian woman, Aasia Bibi.

The source of his guilt -- realisation that the case was not based on facts but on hyped religious emotions and personal bias of some village women.

Aasia has been languishing in Sheikhupura jail since a sessions court awarded her death sentence for insulting Prophet Muhammad. [sic]

Salam confided in friends that he was thinking of discontinuing the case against Asia and that he would not attend an appeal hearing in the Lahore High Court later this year. This might have presented the most obvious means of diffusing the tensions surrounding this highly emotional case.

Instead, a British organization has insisted that Salam proceed with the case. The leader of the Khatm-e-Nabuwat group (whose name means "Seal of the Prophet") dispatched his son to the Nankana district of Punjab, where the original offence is alleged to have taken place and where Salam currently lives. "We will chase her [Asia] through hell … don't worry about the money, [we're] hiring best lawyers," Salam was told.

That a British organization –- whose members are presumably British citizens – should put its weight behind championing such religious intolerance and persecution anywhere is a scandal.

To do so in a country already crippled by millenarian extremism, where such matters cost innocent lives, is unconscionable. How bitterly ironic that young Pakistani lawyers are risking their lives to offer Asia her most basic of human rights, legal representation in court, while British Muslims living in a free and secular country are actively bankrolling attempts to execute her.

The Khatm-e-Nabuwat is not an insignificant group. It enjoys close connections with the Pakistani establishment and has previously met with Pakistan's High Commissioner in London. From London, it promotes a deeply sectarian and divisive message -– particularly against Ahmadis, the persecuted group Taseer had tried to support before his assassination.

The group's website describes Ahmadi's as, "nothing but a gang of traitors, apostates and infidels."

One of its preachers in the London borough of Newham warned that if Pakistan's blasphemy laws were repealed, "the 1953 Lahore agitation against the Qadianis will be repeated in the streets once more. The streets and roads of Lahore were filled with blood in that agitation." The 1953 attack to which he refers was a sectarian massacre of Ahmadis in Pakistan.

The Central Convener of the Khatm-e-Nabuwat group, Abdul Latif Khalid Cheema, who resides in Pakistan, has regularly visited London and spoken at events for the group, spreading their sectarian message. In Pakistan, days after Taseer's assassination, he was among the radical leaders glorifying the governor's death and condemning Asia Bibi. Small wonder then that his group should now be financially supporting the case against her.

British Muslims supporting Khatm-e-Nabuwat are now culpable in her fate and, more generally, to the spread of sectarian violence both in Pakistan and the United Kingdom. A spokesman for the Ahmadi community warned:

We appeal to the authorities to nip this in the bud; otherwise this campaign of hatred against Ahmadi Muslims today will tomorrow grow into a threat against other moderate Muslims and indeed the wider society.

The government should investigate those fomenting unrest abroad and, where possible, bring prosecutions against the individuals concerned. This might include investigating possible breaches of the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 which makes it an offense to intimidate and persecute individuals on the basis of their race or creed.

The radical Islamic cleric – an iconic figure to the Jihadists and widely believed to have been right hand to Osama Bin Laden in Europe -- Abu Qatada (original name, Omar Othman) won his appeal at the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights on January 16 against being deported from the UK to Jordan, where he has been convicted in absentia of terror two major terrorism plots.

Abu Qatada arrived in Britain on a forged United Arab Emirates passport in 1993, and has been in and out of prison since 2002 when he was arrested under the anti-terrorism law. Before that he was caught red-handed by the British police with an envelope for the Chechnyan Mujahdieein [Islamic holy warriors] containing 805 British pounds. He has been a focal point of extremist fund-raising, recruitment and propaganda.

The ruling of European Court of Human Rights not only thwarted British judgments and principles on deportation, but also ignored the British Government's bilateral agreements -- known as Memoranda of Understanding -- on deportation requests that had been established with Lebanon, Jordan, Ethiopia and Morocco. British Home Secretary Theresa May reacted by saying, "I am disappointed that the court has made this ruling."

The British government can make a last appeal against the ruling within three months; if it does not appeal, the terror cleric will be free to leave Belmarsh Prison where he is currently being held.

The British judgment was thwarted by European judges, whose British president, Sir Nicolas Bratza, has never held a senior post in UK. Tory MP Dominic Raab correctly said "The Strasbourg court has imposed a new category of restrictions on our ability to deport serious criminals and suspected terrorists. Placing the burden on Britain to ensure foreign criminals and terrorist suspects are tried according to UK standards in their home countries will impede our capacity to deport those who pose a risk in this country. This is a classic example of mission creep, with judicial legislation from Strasbourg riding roughshod over decisions that should be determined by UK courts."

Abu Qatada went on the run after 9/11 but was arrested in 2002. Three years back, an Englishman, Edwin Dyer, was kidnapped by the nomads in Northwest Africa and sent to the notorious Al-Qaeda militants based in Mali, a country in which Muslims are dominant. The militants threatened to kill Dyer if the British government refused to release Abu Qatada from prison and hand over a ransom. The British Government, however, has a long-standing policy against negotiating with terrorists. So the Al-Qaeda militants killed Edwin Dyer.

In December 2005, Abu Qatada made a video appeal to the kidnappers of another Englishman, peace activist Norman Kember in Iraq. Kember later faced a backlash after agreeing to help secure the release of Qatada, one of the world's most dangerous terror suspects. Kember,in his 70s, was later rescued by the SAS in March 2006.

Abu Qatada clearly has profound connections with terror networks, even though has UK failed to file any specific charge against him. The ruling of European Court, however, will never be able to assure the world that there will be no more bombings, terror attacks, kidnappings and dozens of innocent people slaughtered in which Abu Qatada is not involved.

The New York Times cites the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as a credible source, while continuing its policy of never mentioning that CAIR was founded by the Muslim Brotherhood, and operates as a Hamas support group.

NYT also suppressed the facts that CAIR was named an unindicted co-conspirator 2007 Holy Land Foundation conspiracy trial, which resulted in the FBI cutting off all formal contact with the group and that an FBI official has described CAIR as a "front for Hamas."

NYT primarily relies on two sources for comments: Zead Ramadan of CAIR-NY, and Faiza Patel, of the Brennan Center of Justice, but which the Times deliberately fails to mention that both of whom represent organizations that have repeatedly refused to condemn Hamas and other Islamic terrorist groups or have blamed the FBI for fabricating Islamic terror plots.

An IPT investigator videotaped Ramadan at a press event refusing to answer her questions as to whether Hamas is a terrorist organization.

The Times cites CAIR's Zead Ramadan as a legitimate source of criticism of the film but fails to report that Ramadan contributed $1,000 to Viva Palestina, an organization led by noted anti-Semite George Galloway, that supports Hamas financially and politically, in 2010.

Patel of the Brennan Center has long been a critic of law enforcement's attempts to counter terrorism, even denouncing the NYPD's operation that resulted in the arrest of accused lone-wolf jihadist Jose Pimentel, charged with plotting to bomb U.S. soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Times failed to report that their only two sources for their story--CAIR and the Brennan Center, who are made to seem independent and impartial are actual apologists for Islamic terrorist groups. In fact, the Times failed to report that the Brennan Center received CAIR's "Safe While Free" Award in 2009.

The Times failed to report one actual flaw in the film but based its demonization of the film based largely on emails it did not disclose that it received from CAIR, a Hamas front group

In a front-page story on Tuesday discussing the documentary film, "The Third Jihad," and its use by the NYPD in training, The New York Times once again collaborates with radical Islamists to help shape the news. The article revealed the newspaper's bias, from the vaguely threatening headline – "In Police Training, a Dark Film on U.S. Muslims" - and by relying on those who are not simply opposed to the film, but have previously demonstrated their support of radical Islamists by both word and by association with similarly aligned groups.

The Times' article, written by Michael Powell, primarily relies on the opinions of Zead Ramadan of the Council on American-Islamic Relations' New York chapter (CAIR-NY) and Faiza Patel of the Brennan Center, both of whom aver that the NYPD acted questionably by showing city police the film, to present the case. Ramadan asserts that the movie "defiled our faith and misrepresented everything we stood for." Patel stated that, "The police have shown an explosive documentary to its officers and simply stonewalled us."

The problem with Ramadan and Patel, left unsaid by the newspaper, is found in their words and associations. As has been its longstanding policy, the Times never mentions that CAIR is a Hamas support group, created by the Muslim Brotherhood to present and promote its interests. (Of course, even if one day the Times did acknowledge that, it would still have to break another self-imposed taboo of having never once called Hamas a terrorist organization.)

In contrast to the newspaper, the film does reveal how CAIR was created shortly after a secret 1993 meeting in Philadelphia involving members of the Muslim Brotherhood's Palestine Committee. The goal was for CAIR to operate as a pro-Hamas lobbying group, without being publicly linked to Hamas.

The FBI later cited that evidence, which was used to help name CAIR as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 2007 Holy Land Foundation conspiracy trial, in explaining why it cut off formal communication with CAIR. "Until we can resolve whether there continues to be a connection between CAIR or its executives and HAMAS," FBI Assistant Director Richard Powers wrote in April 2009, "the FBI does not view CAIR as an appropriate liaison partner."

But CAIR refused to address the documentary's substance. Instead, the group issued a press release quoting Ramadan comparing it to the Nazi-era film "Triumph of the Will" and the silent movie "Birth of a Nation." Ramadan voiced his concerns to NYPD chief Raymond Kelly, who said he would "take care of it" and department spokesman Browne denounced the film as "wacky."

All of this was left out of the article on Tuesday, which also failed to inform readers about the questionable backgrounds of the movie's critics. The story said nothing about the fact that in 2010 Ramadan contributed $1,000 to Viva Palestina, an organization founded by the notorious anti-Semite George Galloway, and which supports Hamas financially and politically, or that CAIR-NY in 2008 issued a statement calling for the release of Sami al-Arian, who pleaded guilty to conspiring to contribute funds to Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a designated terrorist group.

The Investigative Project on Terrorism attended a Dec. 15, 2011 press conference held by a group calling itself the Committee to Stop FBI Repression, and asked if he considered Hamas a terrorist organization. Ramadan was asked point-blank: "Do you consider Hamas a terrorist organization?"

[click above to view the video or click here to see the video and a full transcript]

Ramadan proceeded to tap-dance around the question. He replied by stating that, "Islam, myself, and I think all people of conscience, are opposed to all terrorism in all of its forms against all people of the world. Anyone who is innocent that is killed, it's not the way of the Islamic people or people who stand for liberty and justice. Thank you very much."

Our investigator pressed forward, asking Ramadan about Hamas specifically. Ramadan refused to answer, stating that his concern was "the American Bill of Rights situation that we now have."

Ramadan then proceeded to attack the questioner. "You want to take our foreign policy issue and make it the number one issue in the world. No. The issue we have right here is the problem we have in America, and we're eroding," he said.

Ramadan added that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had gone to Myanmar to talk about the erosion of human rights and appeared to be "bringing that back here" and "showing how to erode our civil rights here."

Again, our investigator noted that Ramadan was evading the question about Hamas.

Over and over, CAIR spends a lot of effort urging Muslim Americans not to cooperate with law enforcement. Speaking at CAIR-NY's "Annual Banquet and Leadership Conference" in April 2011, board member Lamis Deek implored her audience not to speak to the FBI, NYPD or other law enforcement agencies.

"It's very important to not speak to law enforcement of any type, not just FBI agents," she said. "We're talking about the New York Police Department, we're talking about tax agents, we're talking about everybody."

Deek said that if the FBI shows up claiming it has a warrant for someone's arrest, they need to ask to see the warrant because "Mossad" agents had been "go[ing] around pretending to be FBI." She warned that "they" (it was unclear whether she was referring to the Mossad, the FBI, or both) will threaten to "seriously blackmail" people.

Faiza Patel of the Brennan Center - which is sufficiently in accord with CAIR that in 2009 it received CAIR's 'Safe While Free' Award - offers complementary positions. At a Nov. 17 forum in Washington entitled "Islamist Radicalization, Myth or Reality," Patel appeared to suggest that any effort by law enforcement to look for signs of radicalism in the Muslim community was doomed to failure. "You can't expect the community to behave as your partner if at the same time you're subjecting them to intense surveillance and monitoring," she said.

And if Muslims were in denial about the existence of radical Islamist ideologies in their communities, perhaps law enforcement should defer to them, Patel added: "If the community doesn't believe that radicalization or extremism or extremist views or extremist ideologies is (sic) a problem in their own community, then you should also understand that maybe they know what they're talking about, and not be spending police resources this way."

In a Huffington Post op-ed, Patel denounced the NYPD's operation that resulted in the arrest of accused lone-wolf jihadist Jose Pimentel, charged with plotting to bomb U.S. soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.

It should not come as a surprise that The New York Times left all of this critical information out of Tuesday's article, given the paper's long history of covering for CAIR, the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist organizations. As we have noted before, Times reporters like Andrea Elliott and columnists like Nicholas Kristof have published stories glossing over the radical background of Salafist cleric Yasir Qadhi, dean of academic affairs at the Houston-based AlMaghrib Institute, and whitewashing the Muslim Brotherhood's radical record and hostility towards Israel.

Last December, after Kristof penned a column in which he claimed that Brotherhood officials in Egypt had been behaving responsibly, Eric Trager of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy described Kristof as "credulous" about the Brotherhood. After interviewing some of the organization's members who had just been elected to Parliament, Trager wrote in the New Republic that, "Far from being moderate, these future leaders share a commitment to theocratic rule, complete with a limited view of civil liberties and an unmistakable antipathy for the West."

Nonetheless, the NYPD, apparently responding to pressure from the media and perhaps from politicians, including Mayor Bloomberg, who denounced the film, stopped showing the documentary.

Somebody [at the NYPD] exercised some terrible judgment," Bloomberg said Tuesday. "As soon as they found out about it, they stopped it." The mayor gave no indication that he had actually seen the film.

Zuhdi Jasser, president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy and narrator of the film, took exception to Bloomberg's comments. "I could not disagree more," he said. "The fact that Bloomberg made such a comment without providing any evidence that the film was in error indicates that the mayor's comment was "careless," Jasser said.

Bloomberg's ignorance should not be surprising given his administration's friendly relationship with CAIR-NY. In May 2009, for example, the mayor's education policy advisor, Fatima Ashraf, hosted the Islamist group's annual banquet and fundraiser, where she gushed praise for CAIR-NY. Ashraf called it "a shining star among Muslim organizations in the country," adding that "their sincerity and motivation" and "genuine desire to make positive change for Muslims is what really makes them stand out."

In similar fashion, Bloomberg's uninformed position is mirrored by the Times article, which does not provide any examples, or specific information of any kind, to back up criticism of the film.

The article hints in rather foreboding fashion that the film is an effort to scare people about the threat posed by radical Islam: "Ominous music plays as images appear on the screen: Muslim terrorists shoot Christians in the head, car bombs explode, executed children lie covered by sheets and a doctored photograph shows an Islamic flag flying near the White House."

Even in this brief description of the film, The New York Times got it wrong. According to Clarion Films, which produced the documentary, the photograph of the White House with an Islamic flag on top was taken from Islamist sources, not altered by the filmmakers.